


His Name is Chris Webster

by nagitok



Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Canon Rewrite, Gen, I'm weak for adopting characters who were only in a story for 0.5 seconds, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Vignette, because heck u fellowes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-18
Updated: 2019-10-18
Packaged: 2020-12-22 21:00:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21083015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagitok/pseuds/nagitok
Summary: A simple little drabble that fleshes him out and rewrites the ending of THAT scene from the film. Probably not historically accurate or plausible for the film due to a line I forgot, but I don't care.#justiceforchriswebster





	His Name is Chris Webster

His name is Chris Webster.  
He lives in a flat alone with two cats. He enjoys coffee over tea (and gets made fun of for it by his peers). He enjoys listening to the radio, and dancing whether anyone is watching or not. He’s a gentleman in his mid or late thirties, and a shadow among the streets of York. Chris Webster has two secret lives.  
And tonight, downstairs in the pub beneath his tenement, he’d indulge in the both of them.

The job was an easy one: watch for Uranians. Chris would spend most of his evenings playing cards with a cigarette to his lips. It was boring, for the most part (not that he'd complain about the easy pay). He’d been tasked with keeping an eye out on anything about “one of those queer dens”. Chris, of course, claimed to know nothing. Sometimes he’d even given false accounts or evidence. Did this make him a corrupt part of the law? Maybe. But the way he saw it, better to fight the system from the inside than turn his back on his community.

Ah, damn. Chris set his drink down on the bar with a _clink_\- that man was looking at him after all. Chris fought back a grin. He was so conspicuous! The poor bastard would get caught if he didn’t get him out of there. He approached the man who’d failed to hide his doe eyes and blushing cheeks. He was cute. Chris watched the man smile and nod, playing along like putty in his hands. It was kind of laughable, and he was just thankful either the landlord didn’t notice or care.  
Typical that the man (Barrow, he found) would name drop the place. Chris was quick to hurry him along out of there. 

His name is Chris Webster.  
  
He works as a private investigator for York law enforcement. And maybe he’d grown a little soft, a little careless. Perhaps his tips and evidence lost their edge. Because god damn it, they found the place.  
The fear in Mr. Barrow’s eyes. The mass panic- many of the men were more experienced and knew how to slip out. How to keep an eye out, speak Polari, all the business you needed to survive. But some of them did not, like chickens without their heads. And Mr. Barrow was one of them.

_Damn._ And he'd made it his one job for this one night to protect him. “Well done, Webster.” he was told by his cohorts. Protocol followed, and he was excused. It wasn’t his job to make the arrests, just to find them.  
He had enjoyed dancing with Mr. Barrow. He’d enjoyed showing him this world, and making him feel safe. By the time Chris had gotten through the checks, and barriers, and the “hold on, I need to ask you somethings” and was there to free Barrow, he'd already been released by somebody.

He never did find out what his first name was, or his occupation.  
Typical, it was always the ones who came and went like _that_ that left the greatest impact.  
Maybe, at the least, it wasn’t too late for another drink. He needed it after how things went.


End file.
